Why Politicians Hate Austerity - In One Simple Chart

Just as our political class in the US is spending its time focused on the tax-'em-til-they-bleed side of the equation as opposed to the cut-em-to-the-bone austerity side of the income statement; so the evidence is clear (thanks to the following chart) - austerity doesn't get you re-elected. When all that matters is your next government paycheck for your 'elected' position, far from being for the people, austerity is avoided as vehemently as possible. Not only does social unrest increase (as the 'people' have become used to unsustainable standards of living) but incumbent popularty sinks - rapidly.

What austerity? I know lots of so called poor people, who have top tier Directv, 3 cars, have a house, have Iphones etc etc. Most people in this country don't even know what austerity means.

I'd say if there is any austerity at all, its for people who actually have a job whether its minimum wage or $250k/yr. They are getting nailed by higher fees, property taxes, and inflation on food and fuel. And if they are a saver, they aren't getting squat for their savings from the bank. Theres your austerity.

austerity of not, looks like true colors come out and politicians lose popularity over time.

same for US presidents as dirty political kickbacks surface over time.

don't mistake leasing versus ownership. poor people lease. their cars are owned by banks, homes are owned by mortage issuers, iphones are on a monthly lease as well as cable TV. Rich people might have the same thing, but they have perpetual ownership.

Why would a puppet politician care about reelection? Once they're in the system, they're set for life, and the masters pulling their strings love austerity. Austerity means you pay more taxes and get less in return, and in a few years, everyone will be a happy Swede, paying 80% taxes, worshiping government, thinking mediocre first-aid is the best "free" health care in the world.

What's amusing is all this talk of austerity. Previously austerity focused on reducing government spending in order to leave more money in the hands of people in the private sector to do with as they wished. That could be consumption, savings or investment. In any case, it was a more efficient use of money than could ever be done by government. What we have here is the reduction in government spending not to permit the public to keep more of their hard earned money but in order to pay off investors and banks for debts that cannot be repaid by any means except by blowing up the economy. That's not austerity, that WEALTH TRANSFER!!!

Dutch politicians and leaders are confused. They are following the rules, but end of day they saw a bad quarter for the Dutch economy. Interestingly they are not looking to blame themselves. First of all everything deteriorated or was worse than expected. Export for instance grew, but less than expected. Unemployment grew as well more than expected. One scape goat was mentioned the consumer whom seems to be unwilling to spend. At least that is according to our brilliant leaders the cause of the down turn. There were highlights as well. Government spending increased as did health care expenditure.

Our leaders still seem to believe they are doing the right thing. They increase regulation leading to an increased number of government employees. They increase health care cost and regulation and continue to siphon off from whom ever is still able to pay some wealth to distribute it into their own ever increasing need. They funded heavily into the PIIGS and provided loans that not only did not pose any risk at all those loans gave us a handsome return. Imagine that are they not brilliant. But how did they fund their own increased expenditure, well by increasing government debt and increasing the burden on households. They fail to understand that the result of this increased burden results in a decrease of household spending. That part apparently is too hard to understand for our esteemed leaders. What do I know; I mean all I do is try to manage the finances of a small business enterprise. In a small business it is quite simple. If the demand for your product diminishes one usually does not meet the drop in revenue with an increase in prizes as this is likely to result in even less demand. One decreases expenditure.

This won't work for a big government apparatus of course. If government started to decrease spending then it would have been so much worse. Our esteemed and brilliant leaders therefore have made plans that will ensure costs in health care will continue to rise and they earn more taxes to support their good work. Now if that damned consumer will just stop saving and please just start spending everything will be fine.

We also had the highest inflation for years (2.9%) despite the fact that yoy average house prises dropped 12%. Damn you Dutch consumer just go out there and spend more, borrow more and spend more hurry up our esteemed leaders rely on you to help them to get things in order again. Sigh over here in the Netherlands everything is fantastic and we have very smart and very esteemed leaders who are doing the right things to get us through the crises we are in such a great and fantastic condition. We will hardly notice the crises at all.